


Morning after Black Car Night

by Kalypso



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-20
Updated: 2010-10-20
Packaged: 2018-01-03 09:02:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1068615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalypso/pseuds/Kalypso
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Donovan and Lestrade review her evening out in a black car.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Morning after Black Car Night

**Author's Note:**

> I love Donovan, because she never hesitates to say exactly what she thinks, even when it's asking for trouble. Perhaps she's more like Sherlock than she realises?

Sally Donovan stared at her laptop, but she still had not written a word of her report on yesterday's knifing. When the phone rang, she knocked a mug of cold coffee over her notes before she managed to answer it.

"Black car night?" asked a familiar voice. A second of relief as she recognised it for the boss's was drowned by those three words.

"Come on, we're having a coffee," he said. "Downstairs."

A moment later Lestrade emerged from the glass box to her right, and they headed for the canteen. His body language seemed friendly, but he said no more to her until they were sitting down waiting for the drinks to cool. Even then he left her to start. Interrogation technique, encouraging her to blurt out whatever came into her head. Oh well, superior officer's privilege.

"So," she said. "You know about it."

"Sergeant Donovan jumping when the phone rings? _Something's_ up."

"But you knew before you rang me. You knew exactly what it was. Was it _official_ , then?"

"He's official as they come. Nothing to do with me, though. I just saw your face when you came in, and the way you sat staring at your laptop. Oh yes, and a big black car passed me in the road last night."

At least Lestrade hadn't developed Sherlock's ability to deduce your entire week from the way you'd brushed your hair this morning. But that didn't quell her rising sense of alarm.

"I didn't think he _could_ be official," she said. "I mean - he threatened my career, but I thought he was bluffing, because he offered me _money_. Why do that if he could just call me in and order me?"

" _He's_ official, but what he's asking for isn't. That's his private interest."

"Why's he interested in Freak?"

"Brother."

" _Oh_." Sally thought for a minute. "Figures. Never thought there'd be somebody who could get my hackles up more than Freak does... But if Superfreak's some sort of government bigwig, why doesn't he _pretend_ he can order us to spy on Sherlock?"

Lestrade pulled a face. "Another thing they've got in common - taste for melodrama. Or maybe just curiosity about which way we'll jump. Or he gets a laugh out of watching us decide. Sounds like you turned him down?"

"Er... yes." He waited, as if hoping for more. She sighed. "I said that _even_ if taking a bribe wasn't betraying everything I stood for as an officer of the law, he was as mad as Sherlock Holmes if he thought I'd ever _consider_ getting close enough to that man to learn anything not obvious to anyone in a hundred-metre radius, like him being an arrogant obnoxious psychopath who knows everything except the basic skills the rest of us were born with." She looked nervously at Lestrade. "Was that the wrong answer?"

He smiled ruefully. "There isn't a right one. Either you turn him down and he retaliates by blocking your career, or you co-operate and never get promoted because you're useful where you are."

"Oh." That solved one mystery - why Lestrade had never made DCI - but was hardly reassuring. "So we're all stuck with Freak for ever. How the _hell_ did I get mixed up in this?"

"Sorry. It's not like Sherlock's got many friends. His brother has to fall back on enemies, mostly." Lestrade paused for a moment. "Anderson hasn't said anything?"

"Anderson?" For once, her surprise overcame the awkwardness of being asked about him. "He _can't_ have tried Anderson. He hates being around Freak even more than I do." She stared. "You saw him with the car, too?"

Lestrade shrugged. "No need. He didn't snipe back when Sherlock insulted him last week. And kept trying to chat to John Watson."

He was right. And Anderson had stood her up a few nights before that, and got quite stroppy when she asked if his wife had come home early. End of the road, then. She'd never thought it was long-term.

"How do you put up with it?" she asked. He knew she meant Sherlock. "He's so _awful_ , and he treats you like shit, and you've had to take it for years..."

"Well, the lives he saves have to count for something," said Lestrade. "And I can take his crap if it keeps him inside the tent and in touch with _some_ moral principles. What if he'd chosen to apply his brain to being a criminal mastermind instead?"

"He'd never focus long enough," muttered Sally. "And he'd have to get his underlings to follow orders without them whacking him every time he told them what idiots they were."

"I think he's growing up a bit. I haven't seen him high for a while - and he's been better since Watson turned up."

She nodded, reluctantly. "Better" by Sherlock's standards was still appalling, but his little friend did seem to soak up some of his worst excesses.

"And, honestly," said Lestrade, suddenly gazing at her - appealing to her? - as if this was something desperately important, "it can be _fun_. You've just got to learn the rules of the game."

"There are rules?"

"Of course there are rules! And breaking them is the best bit."

"The drugs bust?"

"Definitely the drugs bust!" Laughter swept through them at the memory of Sherlock's face when he found them in his flat. "But you can't do it too often, it only works when he's forgotten you can wrongfoot him."

She snorted. "So, basically, you and Superfreak _both_ want me to spend more time with him."

Lestrade grinned. "If you put it like that. But I can't offer the extra cash." He drained the last of his coffee. "Better get back to the office."

As they stood up to go, he glanced at her hesitantly. "You never asked me what _I_ said to Sherlock's brother."

"No need." She flushed, but looked him straight in the eye. "When I'm faced with a tricky professional situation, I don't find myself asking what _Anderson_ would do. Sir."


End file.
